Federal Court due to rule on whaling ban

As the Federal Government decides what to do when Japanese whaling vessels arrive in the Southern Ocean for their annual hunt, it may have to take into account a court ruling on the issue.

Any day now, the Federal Court will hand down a decision on whether the Government should enforce a ban on whaling in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.

Before the election, the Labor Party promised to enforce the ban, but it is yet to announce its plan of action.

Meanwhile, in rough waters off the coast of Antarctica, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society is on the lookout for Japanese whaling vessels.

Paul Watson is at the helm of the society's ship, the Steve Irwin.

"What we're doing is searching for the Japanese fleet. It's a vast area down here, so there's a lot of area to cover," he said.

"The Japanese fleet, if they haven't arrived, [they] certainly will be arriving within the day or so, and I'm not sure whether they've started whaling, but usually it's around December 15 that they begin."

Captain Watson says Sea Shepherd is not there to protest against whaling.

"What we want to do is find the fleet and enforce international conservation law against their illegal activities," he said.

"That means obstruct, interfere, disable, do anything that we can, short of causing any injury to any of their personnel of course, but anything that we can to stop their illegal operations.

"Ideally, what we'd like to do is send them packing back to Japan and out of the whale sanctuary."

Government action

As the whalers near, Australians are waiting to see whether the Labor Party will act on its pre-election pledge to enforce a ban on whaling in the Australian Whale Sanctuary, and enforce any court decision against the Japanese whalers.

The case in the Federal Court was brought by the Humane Society International (HSI).

The previous Coalition government strongly opposed the court action, for fear of its diplomatic implications.

But HSI spokeswoman Nicola Beynon says the new Attorney-General, Robert McClelland, has indicated Labor will not stand in the way.

"Humane Society International can only go so far," she said.

"We can bring the matter to court and we can secure the injunction, but it will be over to the Australian Government to enforce the injunction. We're waiting for judgement any day now.

"The previous government had told the Federal Court that they didn't support the court case, but the current Government has been very supportive of the case in all of their election policies, and they've just written to the court to tell the court not to have any regard to the previous government's views in the case."

Monitoring 'not enough'

A spokeswoman for Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says the Government's plan of action will be announced later this week. She says until then there is no more to add.

Mr Rudd has only said the Government is considering gathering photographic evidence for a possible international legal case. Ms Beynon says that may not be enough.

"If we secure an injunction from the Federal Court for the hunt to be stopped, then the Government's going to have to look at tougher measures than just monitoring the hunt," she said.

"We will be expecting them to stop the hunt."

She says that might mean physical intervention.

"Whatever it takes. We want the Government to stop the hunt going ahead," she said.

"There's 935 minke whales that are going to be killed in this hunt, 50 fin whales and 50 humpback whales. It can't be allowed to go ahead.

"The traditional means of enforcing an injunction would be for the Government to forcibly stop the hunt. If that's not considered appropriate, then the Government needs to find some other way of stopping the hunt."

Ms Beynon says the Government might be waiting for the Federal Court's decision before making its announcement.

"If we are successful in getting an injunction, it would strengthen the Government's hand in acting down there in Antarctica," she said.

Captain Watson says the Government does not need the Navy to take aggressive action against Japanese whalers.

"We welcome anything. I mean, sending in the customs vessel to monitor the hunting is certainly more than the previous government did," he said.

"It doesn't have to be a naval vessel. The custom boat has the authority to do that. They should come down here and say, 'look, you're in violation of international law, you're in violation of the laws of Australia, please remove yourselves from these waters'."